Just Another One
by Moonlit Solstice
Summary: Just another one of those drabble series for the moments that seem unnecessary. Post Songs of the Heart (my other fanfic; you don't have to read it, but it'd be nice). This will get updated whenever I feel like it, but I'll try for one every week.
1. Yawn

Tired azure eyes lock on the cool vermilions of his soul mate, Iwasawa staring back before sighing.

"So, got any ideas?" She asks, tapping her pencil against her desk.

The raven-haired teen hums lightly, letting the nearly inaudible sound ring throughout the empty music room. Groans replace the soft purrs of his voice, ending with a faded sigh.

"Shinn?" Iwasawa mutters.

The soloist sits up straight, his left hand loosening the tie of his summer school uniform while his right fiddles with a lead pencil, giving it a twirl before holding it upright.

"You could write a love song." He suggests, his voice barely above a whisper.

"But love songs are a bit overrated." He deadpans.

"Though with a score like this, a love song seems like the perfect option." A small smile crawls onto his lips, favoring to rise higher right.

Iwasawa notices the slightly smug look on his face, noting the subtle innocence accompanying it. A yawn escapes her lips, so slow and so heavy that she breathes into it, her hand moving to cover her exhaustion. With a drawn-out sigh, she glances toward the soloist, who makes no attempt to cover his own yawn.

"Did you know that yawning's contagious?" A light chuckle escapes his lips. "Ya see, there's this yawn creature that lives off the atmospheric enzymes given out only during a yawn."

The serious tone in the soloist's voice causes Iwasawa to return the small smile on his face. She decides to humor him. "So, what exactly does this 'yawn creature' look like?"

The lead pencil spins around his thumb, sapphire eyes closing in contemplation as the owner bites his bottom lip. She hears him humming again, and she notes how the pitch had lowered by at least an octave (because his voice _did _always get deeper whenever he was lying), and how his eyebrows furrowed a little lower, a little closer to each other by at least a centimeter (because the hairs above his eyes and the muscles beneath them _did _always tense up and shiver whenever he was thinking), and his lips had tightened over his teeth (because the frowning twitches of his mouth _did _always try their best to cover the devious smirk of his plotting face whenever he was feigning innocence), and-

"Well... It's..."

And how-

"It looks like an elephant, minus the... uhh... ears and tusks." He swallows the lump in his throat and tugs on the collar of his oxford shirt, sweat starting to form around the base of his neck. Is it really getting hot in that empty, open music room, or maybe it's just him?

Nonetheless, he continues. "Its feet are more like stubs, and it's pink and purple, and... it doesn't have a tail either."

And how his words had split so easily in misguidance (because his sentences _did_ always show mastery in the art of lies, just not in lying).

Her lips frown in a partial pout, her chin resting in her palm. "How is it that you can imagine something like _this_ but can't even come up with a single lyric?"

The boy beside her beams unevenly, slouching slightly, his head titled a little ways to the right, and she contemplates how childish his eyes look - the hint of their innocence makes it seem as though he had never experienced brokenness and harsh realities and losing battles of one versus one thousand, but she knows.

She knows, wholeheartedly, how that brokenness exists, and how that child-like innocence had expired long before its due date, and how this whole 'yawn creature' spiel is complete and utter malarkey.

But she plays along anyway.

Because this boy, this cobalt-eyed clown, (her soul mate) makes her smile, her lips favoring to rise higher right as her hand moves on its own accord, writing the first lyrics of the supposed love song (and sighing after reading over it).

_It started with a yawn_

_. . ._

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**A/N: I don't own Angel Beats.**

**Anyways, I just wanna write more stuff. So, to help that, I figured starting a drabble series would help since I kind of always get stumped on who/what to write for. But I know this whole yawn thing was a bit weird... **


	2. Scars

Nails dig deeper into his skin as the boy sitting indian-style slouches slightly forward, eyes focusing on the beach towel under - and slightly in front of - him.

Shinn sighs for what seems like the hundredth time that day, wondering why in the world he had let Sekine, with the help of Hisako, drag him to the beach. Of course, he is relieved that Yui, Irie, and Iwasawa came too, as well as the rest of the Shinda Sekai Sensen, but-

Another sigh escapes his lips, his fingers tracing the several scars on his arms and wrists - the ones he had caused himself - before moving towards the ones on the base of his neck and shoulders, then to the ones around his abdomen and ribcage, before resting over his heart - all the ones his parents had caused.

But he feels a bit insecure about the faults and feebleness and slight discolorations unevenly adorning his skin. Because these marks show the world his weakness and imperfections and hatred for himself, and whenever he thinks he let go of his self-animosity, it grows back and metastisizes, and bleeds (blues) from his heartstrings. And he knows the not even the most well-trained of surgeons can fix this (because the only one who did isn't even a surgeon).

Cobalt eyes stare upward, locking with the cool - and slightly concerned - vermillions of his soul mate. She sits beside him, leaning into his shoulder, her fingers (unimpaired and smooth like silk) tracing over the several scars on his arms and wrists - the ones he had caused himself - before moving towards the ones on the base of his neck and shoulder blades, then to the ones around his abdomen and ribcage, before briefly hovering over his heart - all the ones his parents had caused - and interlacing with his own fingers (damaged and calloused and ugly).

He swallows the lump in his throat, hoping to find even a trace of his voice to stutter her name. He fails, and he cannot help but feel inferior.

Because she is so far beyond perfect, and he is so far below flawed.

She is pretty on the outside (and even more so inside), and when their eyes met for that first time - of many times - he knew that it would only ever take all his willpower just to look away. Because souls adorns her skin, and survival, her heart, and passion, her scars (something she has in every sense of the word but physical). Because even when he takes off the rose-colored glasses that permit him to see only the goddess in her, his vision stays in that rose-colored lens.

He inhales deeply - and releases slowly the pent-up breath.

There's no denying it (there's no way he could). She is a goddess; she is perfect (in every sense of the word) and he-

His fingers tighten their grip over hers, firmly enough to make sure she isn't a dream but gently enough to make sure she isn't hurt (he would never intentionally do that, nor even think of it).

And he is slightly lanky, and barely lean, and so scarred and out-of-her-league.

He doesn't deserve her, but he has her, and she has him, and he wonders why someone flawed to the point of perfection could ever be interested in someone like him.

A light sneeze shakes him from his thoughts, and he gives his cool beauty a sideways glance, which she returns. A small smile crawls onto his lips, and she returns one so much more graceful than he could ever imagine.

He doesn't deserve her, but he has her, and she has him.

She has him, scars and all.

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_**A/N: I don't own Angel Beats**_


	3. Windchimes

His ears perk up at the sound of windchimes, pools of cobalt staring more _into _the object than _at_ it.

Remembering a superstition his step-father believed in, a scowl shapes Shinn's lips, fists clenched while memories of his mother slowly fill his mind.

His mother loved hanging windchimes around their hell of a home - between doorways, above windows, and near closets just out of reach from fan blades but not from the winds, - and he never understood why.

He never understood the smiles given to the cadence of the chimes, never heard the sweetness of the rhythms in the winds, never even believed his mother's words when she told him that windchimes attract spirits allowing entrance into another world - one that holds secrets he never knew he _wanted_ to know.

_Windchimes attract spirits. _He scoffs at the thought, remembering a superstition his step-father believed in.

_Windchimes attract spirits, and when naughty spirits visit, the leave you with bruises and scratches. _

A hand reaches up to cover the calloused surface of his scars - they appeared only after his mother remarried.

Because windchimes don't attract spirits that reveal secrets, nor ones that leave mere bruises and scratches, they attract ghosts (that never cease to haunt him) and demons (that never stop scaring him) and devils (that seem more daunting than Lucifer himself).

And all he wanted, was to save himself; all he wanted…

Was to see his mother smile in authenticity - the way she did at those windchimes, the way she _always would _before his father passed away. Not the way her grieving lips forced themselves upward before Shinn took his own life, he never found out how they curved after that.

He was being selfish; he knew - he knows. All he wanted was to smile in authenticity, the way his mother did at those windchimes, the way she _always would _before his father passed away.

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**A/N: I don't own Angel Beats.**


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